


Open Wounds

by litbeyondmeasure



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Angst, Canon Era, F/M, Hiding Injury, Hurt Merlin (Merlin), King Arthur Pendragon (Merlin), M/M, Merlin Confesses His Love For Arthur, Merlin Reflects on Destiny, Merlin's Neckerchief (Merlin), Minor Gwen/Arthur Pendragon (Merlin), No Beta We Die Like Merlin's Happiness, Nothing Like a Lack of Sunlight and Time Alone to Quickly Spiral, Protective Gwaine (Merlin), Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-16
Updated: 2021-03-16
Packaged: 2021-03-24 21:22:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,575
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30078525
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/litbeyondmeasure/pseuds/litbeyondmeasure
Summary: Merlin was simply hunting for garlic when he was attacked by a group of bandits. Next thing he knows, he's alone in the bottom of a pit and slowly bleeding out with very little hope of rescue. Until, quite suddenly, he's not alone any more.(Written for Day 2 of MerthurWeek2021: 'If we don't get out of here—' 'We will!')
Relationships: Gwaine/Merlin (Merlin), Gwen/Arthur Pendragon (Merlin), Lancelot & Merlin (Merlin), Merlin & Arthur Pendragon (Merlin)
Kudos: 53
Collections: Merthur Week 2021





	Open Wounds

When Merlin stirred, the darkness had wrapped him in its arms and was holding him in a close embrace. He struggled to sit up properly, crying out as a rope of thorns seemed to tighten around his abdomen. Recent events were blurred in his mind and he blindly grasped around him, fingers finding moist earth. As his hands travelled further afield, the texture they were met with was the same. Breaths becoming shallower, Merlin called out and, receiving no answer, he quietly lit a fire in his palm.  


He was sat in an enclosed pit and covered in his own blood. Throwing back his head, Merlin could make out embers of light above his head. There were snatches of sunlight clawing their way through the top of the pit and, judging by the translucent hue above him if he squinted hard enough, Merlin hazarded a guess that it was covered with foliage. And foliage was easy enough to deal with.  


Taking a deep breath, he threw the flames straight up and they burst through the leaves, unleashing natural light. Ever so gently, burning fragments of nature fluttered down towards him and Merlin looked down at his stomach to assess the situation. Heart thumping, he lifted his shirt.  


There was a large, slender gash that stretched from one hip to the opposite lower ribs – a trail from a sword – and Merlin pushed his head back into the earth, forcing himself to take deep breaths. The fact that everything but blood was still inside him, where it should be, was a good sign, but he didn’t have the strength to heal himself and if he didn’t get help soon then he’d bleed out. Knowing that it wouldn’t be much help but would be better than nothing, Merlin raised his shaking hands to his throat and untied the knot in his neckerchief, slowly unwinding the garment.  


Using the little strength he had left, he pushed his body forwards and carefully began to wrap the neckerchief around his wound, closing his eyes to prevent the tears from falling. He’d diverged from the knights for five minutes before being attacked by bandits and he hadn’t even had the opportunity to throw several of them back before one ran a sword across him like Gwaine had run a finger along his cheek so many times. Tying a knot in the makeshift bandage, Merlin checked his pockets. As expected, the little money he’d had on him was gone, and he was thankful that he had left most of his precious items in Camelot. Well, he’d taken Gwaine with him. And Arthur.  


Merlin dug his hands into the earth again and closed off any thoughts of Gwaine. His partner, doubtless, would be wanting to abandon the mission to find him, but Merlin knew how crucial this peace treaty was. Arthur wouldn’t want to jeopardise that for a servant. He just wished that he’d kissed Gwaine one last time. As he unconsciously shifted, a spasm of pain fluttered up his body and a whimper of pain escaped him. Had he not been alone, he would have been significantly quieter. But nobody was around to mock him for expressing some of the agony he was bearing.  


It served him right for trying to add garlic to the food. He’d just wanted to add a little flavour to it, what with Arthur constantly complaining about how bland the dishes were when travelling. It had been brought up again that afternoon and Merlin had made a sharp remark about Arthur maybe cooking for once before storming off to find some wild garlic. He should have been gentler with him. The King was under a lot of strain to maintain the peace that had been established two years before and Gwen had asked him to make sure Arthur didn’t put too much pressure on himself.  


Struck by a sudden realisation, Merlin’s eyes snapped open. He had strayed far enough from his friends for the bandits to have easily passed by them from a distance. They had probably just thought he needed some time to cool off and thought it best to leave him be until he returned of his own accord. It could be hours before they realised something was wrong, and Merlin could easily be dead by then.  


He let the tears roll freely down his cheeks.  


In the darkness he’d created for himself, Merlin thought of Lancelot. The guilt over his death would hang heavy in Merlin’s heart for the rest of his life, no matter how many times Gwaine left his gentle mark on it. Merlin should have been the one to die. Protecting Arthur was his responsibility, not Lancelot’s. Perhaps if he’d told Lancelot everything about his destiny, not just the magic part, then Lancelot wouldn’t have walked through the veil. Lancelot had always had a habit of walking away from situations if there were already too many parties involved, and you couldn’t get a much bigger party than destiny. Perhaps if he’d told Lancelot about his destiny then it would be Lancelot running his fingers through Gwaine’s hair every night, not Merlin. Perhaps if he’d told Lancelot about his destiny, and he had been allowed to walk through the veil, then Merlin would be safe in the knowledge that he had achieved his goal and Arthur was secure.  


As it was, Merlin was constantly on edge, just waiting for Camelot to collapse. He’d lost so many people on the way to that precise moment of being stuck in a pit and bleeding out. It only made sense that the confirmation that Arthur had brought about the Golden Age would be Merlin’s death; he would have served his purpose. They might have been two sides of the same coin once, but times had changed. Arthur had Gwen, whom Merlin couldn’t be happier for – she had always been a queen in his eyes – and, for the most part, was secure in his role as king. There were still times when he quietly asked Merlin for his thoughts as the sun dipped below the horizon, or the clouds obscured the midday light, but they had become more and more infrequent over the past couple of years.  


For the past year, Merlin had been expecting to drop dead at any given moment as an indicator that he and his destiny had reached their expiry date. But every day he woke up, sometimes beside Gwaine, still breathing, then went about with his daily routine. The routine that he’d been drudging through for years. The routine that should have filled Merlin with comfort at its stagnancy, but instead filled him with perpetual dread for the day that it all inevitably changed.  


Remembering that he was bleeding out, Merlin pushed his hands onto his stomach and yelped quietly, taking deep breaths. If he was going to die, he was at least going to hold on for as long as he could to properly say goodbye to the ones he loved.  


_‘Merlin!’_  


Merlin let out a strangled cry in response to his name, tears dripping onto his legs at the stretching of his wound, and set his lips into a thin line. Removing his quivering hands, he gently removed his shoe and braced himself, hurling the boot as high as he could. It rocketed up to the top of the hole, briefly saw the light of dwindling day, and came crashing back down. Merlin didn’t have the energy to put it back on his foot and instead assumed the position he’d been in before, with his hands applying pressure to the injury.  


‘Merlin?’ Haloed by the setting sun was Arthur Pendragon, who was leaning over the edge of the hole. ‘Is that you?’  


‘Yes,’ Merlin croaked out.  


Arthur fumbled with his cloak and wrapped his hand around one corner, dangling the rest of it into the pit. ‘Grab hold of this and I’ll pull you up.’  


Had Merlin been able to stand, he would have easily been able to grasp the garment. ‘Don’t you think you should get the knights first?’  


‘No, it’ll only take a minute to get you out.’ Arthur insistently shook the cloak. ‘Come on.’  


Gritting his teeth and trying to make as few noises of pain as possible, Merlin reached for his boot and slid his foot in it. He gripped the side of the pit tightly as he pushed himself into a standing position, edging ever so slowly towards the cloak.  


As he clung to it, he looked up expectantly at Arthur, who looked down at him. ‘You’re going to have to do a bit of work, Merlin, come on. Put your feet on the side and try to walk up as I pull you.’  


Merlin could feel the blood running into the waistband of his trousers as he moved. Shakily, he planted both feet on the earthy wall and pushed away the pulsating sensation in his head. He managed to move an inch before his legs gave way and he collapsed to the ground.  


The cloak landed on top of him and Merlin didn’t even have a chance to brace himself, let alone move, before Arthur came tumbling down and set his stomach on fire, the smoke from the pain darkening his vision.  


The darkness didn’t last for long, though, as Merlin was teased into the light by someone slapping his face. ‘Merlin. Now is not the time to be messing with me. I’m definitely not heavy enough to make you pass out.’  


Struggling, Merlin slid into the shadows and propped himself up against the wall, reluctantly covering his stomach with his hands. ‘Not from a normal height, perhaps, but from up there? Besides, I didn’t pass out, I was just winded.’  


‘It looked like you’d passed out to me,’ Arthur disagreed, settling himself on the other side of the pit.  


‘I told you that you should have got the others.’  


‘Now is not the time for “I told you so”, Merlin.’  


‘Now is the perfect time for that, it’s not like there’s much else I can do.’  


Arthur scrutinised him. ‘Did you lose your footing when I was trying to get you out? Because I understand that falling in a pit is going to leave you bruised, but it wouldn’t make you suddenly collapse.’  


Merlin had a decision to make. He could tell Arthur about his injury, watch the king try to heal him with the very limited resources available to him, and die knowing that Arthur would feel guilty for the rest of his life for not being able to save him. Or he could keep quiet, because if Arthur never knew he was injured then he wouldn’t be to blame when Merlin died.  


‘I just lost my footing. You know what I’m like.’  


Arthur rolled his eyes in the growing darkness. ‘What were you even doing out here anyway? It’s not exactly close to the camp.’  


‘I thought there might be wild garlic out here, to add to the stew,’ Merlin answered, adjusting the pressure.  


‘Trust you to fall into a pit when looking for a plant,’ Arthur remarked, nudging Merlin’s foot with his own. ‘And for pulling me into it as well.’  


Merlin plastered a smile across his face. ‘And trust you to go diving headfirst into a rescue mission.’  


‘Hey!’ Arthur threw a handful of dirt at his manservant. ‘They always work out in the end.’  


‘Usually because I save your sorry behind,’ Merlin muttered, shaking the dirt from his hair. He hesitated. ‘How’s Gwaine?’  


Arthur dropped his gaze. ‘Panicking. He’s with Leon. Trying not to let on just how panicked he is, but failing miserably. He says it’s my fault if anything happens to you.’  


‘It’s not your fault, Arthur. And, look, here I am, absolutely fine.’ Merlin flashed him another smile and hoped that the twist of his mouth didn’t betray the lie. ‘Gwaine doesn’t mean it.’  


That was another lie. In Gwaine’s eyes, Merlin could do no wrong. If he ever found out about Merlin’s magic then Merlin wondered if that would change, but that didn’t bear thinking about. Not when he was already pushed to the point of exhaustion. He should have said something years ago. But he had been so terrified of losing everyone, especially without Lancelot to support him, that Merlin had kept quiet. He’d spent his whole life keeping quiet. It was too late now to drop that bombshell on his partner without becoming shrapnel himself.  


‘He’s not wrong, though,’ Arthur quietly said. ‘If I hadn’t made that stupid comment about your cooking then you wouldn’t have gone off—’  


‘Arthur, you can’t take responsibility for every single one of my actions.’  


There was the smallest fragment of Merlin that was whispering poisonous thoughts. He was dying and yet he wasn’t the one being comforted. Yet again, he was providing assurance for someone else, meanwhile his own limbs were growing fatigued from constantly treading water. Merlin closed his eyes. He and Lancelot had always used to support each other in the still breath of dawn and dusk, when they could both slip away from their duties and take shelter beneath a large alder tree in the Darkling Woods. Then Lancelot had walked through the veil and his final anchor had been severed from him. He still had Gaius, that he knew, but it had been different with Lancelot. Lancelot had understood the struggle of having to build everything on lies. Gaius had been lying for so long to Uther after the Great Purge that he had forgotten the turmoil it drowned you in.  


Merlin lightly shook himself. Arthur didn’t know he was dying, which is what Merlin had wanted. To Arthur, there was nothing wrong with Merlin, but he still had guilt weighing on him, as he always did. And part of Merlin’s duty was to carry that guilt for Arthur instead, picking up his fears like he picked up his dirty socks.  


He was so tired.  


‘Arthur…’ He closed his eyes. ‘If we don’t get out of here—’  


‘Which we will.’  


‘Just...shh, let me talk. If we don’t get out of here, then I will regret not telling you something.’ Merlin slowly exhaled, grounding himself with the gentle resistance of the earth as he pushed his head back. ‘I was in love with you. To the point of melodramatic self-sacrifice, which is something I’d still do for you now, but not because I’m in love with you. Because you’re my king, and your life is worth a hundred of mine. I was so desperately in love that I would have one thought about you not being there and I’d want to scream from the battlements with a grief that I didn’t even need to feel, because you were right there. It was completely consuming. And it was _exhausting_. But I couldn’t let you go. But I could never tell you, either.’  


‘Why not?’  


Incredulous, Merlin opened his eyes. ‘Why not? Are you serious? Because you would have laughed at me, or felt uncomfortable and fired me, or increased my chores, or put me in the stocks...Gwaine knows,’ he added, the face of his partner swimming in his mind’s eye. ‘Gwaine was the one to help me get over you. We went to the tavern after Gwen’s coronation and got a little too drunk and spent the night together.’ Merlin closed his eyes again. ‘And it just continued. I was trying to get over you, and Gwaine was trying to get over Lancelot, and, one day, it wasn’t just our bodies that seemed to slot together.’  


Arthur poked at the ground. ‘If you had feelings for me, why did you push me towards Gwen?’  


‘Because I thought it would help me. And you liked each other, and were both my friends, and I wanted you to be happy.’  


‘You should be happy too.’  


‘I am happy.’ As he spoke, Merlin’s tongue felt heavy in his mouth. ‘It all worked out for the best, anyway.’  


‘If you’re over me, why are you telling me?’  


‘For closure. To completely close that chapter. You’re with Gwen and I’m with Gwaine, but I just wanted that part of me to be acknowledged. Quite how I could be so in love with you when you were such a prat, I don’t know.’  


Arthur’s gaze flickered towards him. ‘You should have said something.’  


‘Why?’  


‘Because I might have felt the same way.’  


Raising his head and forcing his eyes open, Merlin squinted at where he thought Arthur was. ‘And did you?’  


Arthur opened his mouth just as a scream of Merlin’s name penetrated the atmosphere. Immediately jumping up, the king removed a glove and threw it out of the pit, bundling up his cloak and making the same motion. ‘Down here!’ he yelled, taking off his other glove and hurling it out of the top.  


Merlin stayed where he was, watching the blurred figure pace up and down restlessly. He’d said his piece and wasn’t going to dwell on anything else. They had all made their choices. It seemed like letting Arthur go was the one choice he could ever have when it came to the King of Camelot. Everything else had been sculpted in the stars and Merlin didn’t have the energy to push them into a new shape.  


Percival’s head appeared over the edge of the pit, illuminated by Elyan’s torch. ‘I take it you could use some help?’  


Arthur shot him a look. ‘If you hold one end of the cloak, then we can hoist ourselves up, given that _Mer_ lin doesn’t lose his footing again.’  


Seizing the cloak that Arthur had thrown, Percival adjusted his position and dropped one end down, holding the other tightly between his fingers as he braced himself. After Merlin’s quiet insistence that Arthur should go first, the king grabbed the highest point he could reach and dug both feet into the earth, gradually making progress. Merlin’s hands, when he momentarily removed them, had gotten incredibly slippery. Swallowing, he placed them back over the wound. He should have used the cloak to bind it more tightly.  


By the time he looked up, Arthur had escaped the pit and was looking expectantly down. ‘Are you coming?’  


‘I don’t think so.’  


Arthur sighed. ‘Look, Merlin, if this is because of what you said before, then you don’t need to worry. Like you said, it’s all worked out for the best. Stop being an idiot and grab the cloak.’  


With a grunt, Merlin tried to engage his core to sit up. He immediately fell back down. ‘Yeah, I don’t think that’s going to happen.’  


‘Why not? You said you were only winded earlier.’  


Merlin removed his hands, which glittered a deep red in the flickering firelight. ‘I was attacked by bandits before they threw me in here. I’m bleeding out.’  


Any expression that had been on Arthur’s face was wiped clean. What he was thinking, Merlin had no idea, and he closed his eyes as his hands instinctively were drawn to the same warm spot. He could hear the trio exchanging furious words and the frantic footsteps that shuddered through the ground loosed dirt onto Merlin’s cheek as he tried to get more comfortable. At least he wouldn’t die alone.  


Merlin wasn’t sure how long he lay there silently, listening to the subtle sounds above ground with an ever-stretching peace. As the blood seeped through his neckerchief, he thought of Arthur’s face when he’d seen the wound and slowly drifted away from the image before it transitioned to that of Gwaine’s face when he would see Merlin’s body. At least he could slip away with the knowledge that perhaps he had accomplished his destiny after all.  


He felt hands underneath him and he was slowly raised from the ground, encased in a soft material. There was a light burning through his eyelids and he tried to open them for one last look at the world but they remained stubbornly shut. His hands had slipped down and he groaned as cold air hit his wound.  


Gentle fingers made their way into his hair and, recognising the grip, Merlin’s mouth twitched. Willing his eyes to open with the dwindling ferocity he had left, Gwaine’s face swam into view. He had one of Merlin’s hands to his mouth as tears splashed down and mingled with the blood. Merlin was distantly aware of someone pushing him upright and wrapping a cloak tightly around his stomach and he fell into Gwaine, gaze roaming across the scene.  


Arthur was stood several paces away, his palms pressed together in front of his face, silently watching as Elyan carefully bound the injury. When Merlin caught his eye his gaze darted away and Merlin sank further into Gwaine, who was quietly berating him for getting stabbed and not saying anything between tears. Merlin looked away from Arthur to push his face into Gwaine’s neck and murmured an apology.  


If he’d known he was going to survive, then Merlin might have left the love confession in the depths of his soul. Arthur had said that he hadn’t needed to worry, but Arthur also did not look at him once until they reached the site of the treaty signing – a full eight hours earlier than intended, having ridden through the night to get Merlin to a physician. And Merlin was left wondering why on earth he’d had to go and open his big mouth.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for taking the time to read this! I appreciate it's quite short in comparison to some of my other things, but Camelove has well and truly wiped me out!! Hope you enjoyed it!
> 
> Playlist for this fic:  
> \- 'Follow You' (Imagine Dragons)  
> \- 'Close' (Nick Jonas & Tove Lo)  
> \- 'full stop' (Jeremy Zucker)  
> \- 'Fucked Up' (Bahari)  
> \- 'All Love' (FLETCHER)  
> \- 'White Blank Page' (Mumford & Sons)


End file.
